This is from the book Absolute Surrender by Andrew Murray
And so the life of the saved ones, of the saints, must needs bear their stamp of deliverance from sin, and full restoration to their original state; their whole relation to God and man marked by an all-pervading humility. Without this there can be no true abiding in God’s presence, or experience of His favor and the power of His Spirit; without this no abiding faith, or love or joy or strength. Humility is the only soil in which the graces root; the lack of humility is the sufficient explanation of every defect and failure. Humility is not so much a grace or virtue along with others; it is the root of all, because it alone takes the right attitude before God, and allows Him as God to do all.
Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him. Romans 5:9 (KJV)
Prodigal: They went to git something, they will be back in a jiffy.
This is from Mildred Shell
On that sunny August afternoon several years ago, there was no indication that anything could mar the beauty and peace of the day. It was a Friday, and I could hear the hum of my husband’s tractor as he mowed the grass in the field next to our backyard.
Our house stands on a hill above the highway about a mile from the little town of Marble Hill, Missouri. Mr. Stephens, a farmer, is our nearest neighbor and he lives a quarter of a mile down the road.
I don’t know what it was that caused me to turn suddenly and look at my husband on the tractor. As I did so, I watched in horror and disbelief as the tractor hit something hard in the grass, then turned over, pinning my husband beneath.
In a panic I began running toward the tractor knowing that I had to get Howard out from under before it burst into flames.
Jack, our ten-year-old son, was already by his father’s side.
Together we pulled and pried, but all our efforts seemed only to hurt Howard, who was lying on his back with the steering wheel pressing against his chest. One of his legs was caught under the back end of the heavy machine, a Farmall Cut, which weighed three thousand pounds.
Our cries for help rang out across the empty field. We could hear the cars go by on the highway, but they couldn’t possibly hear us.
Howard was struggling to breathe–if the weight of the tractor wasn’t lifted off his chest, he might die! Frantically we searched for something to prop up the tractor. There was nothing.
O God, I thought in despair, send someone…anyone!
I didn’t stop to think how hopelessly ridiculous it would be for a woman alone to try to lift a tractor. I only knew that Howard would die if it wasn’t done. With one shoulder leaning against the radiator, I took hold and lifted with all my might…and the tractor moved. I was holding it up, thank God! Howard was breathing easier. He was saved, at least for the moment.
“You try and pull Daddy out,” I said to Jack. “I’ll hold the tractor.”
Jack was pulling as hard as he could, but Howard wasn’t moving.
“I can’t.” Howard was straining to breathe and talk at the same time. “A rock…under my back…I’m hurt.” His leg was still pinned under the tractor. It was obvious that we couldn’t get him out without help.
“Run,” I said to Jack. “Phone Mr. Stephens and ask him to bring help.”
I watched Jack race across the yard and into the house and prayed that our neighbor was at home.
Then, for a while, it was as if time had been suspended. I didn’t seem to be aware of the weight of the tractor and I wasn’t even bothered by the heat. Meanwhile, Howard was struggling to speak. “I…can’t….take….it….much…longer.”
In many private conversations Howard and I had agreed that death was not something to fear. We had surrendered our lives to God many years before. Miraculously, we felt, He had brought Howard back after a head wound nearly killed him on Saipan during World War II. And now, once again, Howard was in God’s hands. With a sudden calmness I knew that if Howard was to live, God would use me to hold up the tractor till help came.
Finally I saw them running toward us–Jack and Mr. Stephens and his son, Jerry, and Henry Thiele, another neighbor. Together they lifted the tractor. The doctor arrived, and then the ambulance. Howard’s leg had to be stitched up, and the doctor said X rays would be necessary. “But I don’t think he’s seriously hurt.”
Then Mr. Stephens took my right arm firmly and said, “Now I’ll take you to the doctor.”
“Me, what in the world for?” I could feel no pain anywhere. But then I looked and saw that the skin and flesh or my left arm and shoulder was hanging in shreds. I could hardly believe what I saw. At the clinic the doctor explained that the heat from the radiator had actually cooked the flesh on my arm and shoulder to the bone.
In a few days Howard came home in a wheelchair to nurse a crushed vertebra in his back. My left arm was helpless until the burnt muscles slowly healed. For months we were quite a pair, both semi-invalids with a house and two children to care for.
Every time we think back to that August Friday, we marvel at the way things worked out. When Jack telephoned our neighbor for help, Mr. Stephens just happened to walk into his kitchen in time to take the call. His son Jerry, who no longer lives at home, just happened to be there visiting that day.
And all the while God was lifting that tractor for almost one hour. I wasn’t. On my own I couldn’t. We still have the tractor, and I have since tried lifting the front end. I can’t budge it.
Then he openeth the ears of men, and sealeth their instruction, Job 33:16 (KJV)
Jennifer Van Allen www.theprodigalpig.com www.faithincounseling.org
It is useless to try to make peace with ourselves by being pleased with everything we have done. In order to settle down in the quiet of our own being we must learn to be detached from the results of our own activity. We must withdraw ourselves, to some extent, from effects that are beyond our control and be content with the good will and the work that are the quiet expression of our inner life. We must be content to live without watching ourselves live, to work without expecting an immediate reward, to love without an instantaneous satisfaction, and to exist without any special recognition.
And he saith unto them, Why are ye fearful, O ye of little faith? Then he arose, and rebuked the winds and the sea; and there was a great calm. Matthew 8:26 (KJV)
Me: Yes, it does, but don’t let the devil get a foothold.
This is from the book The Soul Winner by C.H. Spurgeon
Before I entered the pulpit the other Sabbath morning, the dear deacons and elders of my church gathered around me for prayer. One of them said, “Lord, take him as a man takes a tool in his hand when he gets a firm hold of it and then uses it to work his own will with it.” That is what all workers need: that God may work through them. You are to be instruments in the hands of God, while you actively put forth all the faculties and forces that the Lord has lent to you. Yet never depend upon your personal power, but rest alone upon the sacred, mysterious, divine energy that works in us, by us, and with us on the hearts and minds of men.
If thou be righteous, what givest thou him? or what receiveth he of thine hand? Job 35:7 (KJV)
This might be news to you, but not everyone should have the same access to you.
You are responsible to manage different levels of intimacy, responsibility, influence, and trust with people in your life. Likewise, you are responsible to honor the different levels of access and influence others allow you to have in their lives. These levels are absolutely righteous, healthy, normal, and good. It is supposed to be like this! It has to be like this. When we expect that we should all have equal access to one another, we are setting ourselves up to violate and be violated.
As I besought thee to abide still at Ephesus, when I went into Macedonia, that thou mightest charge some that they teach no other doctrine, Neither give heed to fables and endless genealogies, which minister questions, rather than godly edifying which is in faith: so do. 1 Timothy 1:3-4 (KJV)
